Prey (Male!Naga x Male!Reader)

Chapter 13

Something had Y/n waking up in the middle of the night. He had spent all day working on repairing Mark's radio. When night fell, he drifted off to sleep quite readily, hunger burning in the pit of his stomach like an acidic ache.

Half-asleep Y/n's exhausted, hungered body resisted waking up just yet. His eyelids fluttered and he might've murmured a word or two. He shifted a bit, pressing his back against the cage's cool bars and drifting off once more, his mind in the twilight state between asleep and awake.

Then it came again, the soft hissing, low enough to rattle Y/n's very bones. In an instant, Y/n was fully awake, eyes open and heart squeezing in his chest. What was it? What was going on? Why was the naga hissing? It sounded angry — Y/n couldn't say for sure but the hissing seemed rushed and it slowly gained a harsh undertone.

All of the sudden, it was right by the (h/c) man's ear, a rough growl: "You wake." A simple statement.

Instantly, Y/n was scrambling away from the cage's bars and curling up in the center where he was safest. "What's — what's going on?"

There was a heavy silence following Y/n's question. It was so quiet now Y/n could hear the naga draw in a breath.

"I watch you — your kind. I have ever since you came here... lowering from the sky on metal birds. Yet, you yourselves are wingless..." the quiet words prickled against Y/n's ears, a sharp contrast to the harsh hissing from before. "You are disturbing creatures, making needless noise, eating prey meant for me, even going as far as to mate on my shores... in my territory. You disturb everything you touch. Your language even is harsh, grating; foul...

"...And I will kill every last one of you. Some of you, I will even eat. I will tear into your soft flesh and swallow you whole, if only to remind you of your place..."

Y/n stayed silent, not knowing how the hell he should respond to any of that. Then his brain short-circuited: wait a minute, did the naga just say people have been mating on its shores?! Y/n's mind went a mile a second. Alright, he wanted to know who the hell had been having sex while he and everyone else had been fighting for their fucking lives.

A loud slam jolted the (h/c) man out of his spiraling thoughts. Metal clanged against metal, loud and harsh, echoing back off the cavern walls in a dizzying cacophony of noise.

"Tell me," the naga's voice came again, insidious, "what this is."

Y/n squinted through the darkness, trying to pinpoint the source of the sound.

After a moment, the naga gave an irritated hiss before murmuring, "I forget, your eyes are weak... Come here," the creature commanded, "set your hand against the bars, feel what I am holding and tell me what it is. I know you know..."

Y/n was torn between common sense and unbearable curiosity. On the one hand, he'd have to be an idiot to get anywhere near the naga but on the other hand, he was interested in figuring out what had pissed the creature off so much.

Hesitantly, Y/n stretched his arm out and laid his hand flat against the bars. A moment after, metal rang as whatever the naga was holding moved. Suddenly, Y/n felt the object passing by his fingertips and settling firmly against them.

"Er..." Y/n scooted closer and felt the odd contraption — it was definitely metal; human-made so... Y/n flinched back when his fingers accidentally grazed the naga's own.

But the creature said nothing; gave no reaction to the fleeting touch whatsoever and Y/n's fingers returned.

"It's," the (h/c) man realized slowly, "it's a... gun."